They got started talking about a pop-up last fall, spending two and a half months developing their first menu. Then they went public with Element by holding a one-off dinner Jan. 24 at downtown's Wine Dive.

The three young men are bluntly ambitious. Dinger said their long-term goal is to start a stand-alone restaurant, not just an occasional series of dinners, as is typical with pop-up restaurants.

And they would like to put Springfield chefs on the map.

"We want to be the first people from Springfield to win a James Beard Award in the state of Missouri," Dinger said.

Invoking the name of James Beard — a culinary teacher and food media personality who died in 1985 — is no small thing in the chef community. The James Beard Awards are the Oscars of American food.

So far, they plan to host a dinner on the last Sunday of each month, serving just 16 guests per service.

Their next dinner date — Feb. 25 at The Artisan's Oven — is already sold out. The one after that — March 25 at Missouri Spirits — only has a few seats remaining.

Element's first three multi-course meals have been priced between $85 and $100, they said. Generally, Springfield pop-up dinners have been priced no higher than $200 per person.

That's a lot for dinner out in the Ozarks; it's pennies on the dollar compared to many pop-ups elsewhere in the United States.

A dish from a previous Element pop-up dinner.(Photo: Courtesy Element)

The chefs said they try to use the best local ingredients they can find. They estimated that 80 percent of the food they serve is sourced from Springfield, or nearby. They cited suppliers such as Urban Roots Farm, Circle B Ranch and Green Thicket Farm, among others.

Missouri being landlocked, it's impossible for them to source seafood for dishes like the vanilla tea-cured salmon they put on last month's menu. Which — attention foodies — they garnished with lemon crème fraiche and molecular embellishments like coriander foam and black pepper and Scotch pearls.